Global expansion is now an important goal for many companies worldwide. As companies "go global," there come challenges to finding, developing and retaining the best employees at all levels within the organization.

This challenge is particularly compelling at the highest level, the executive leadership level. Deloitte's Global Human Capital Trends stated, "For the third year in a row, leadership soared to become one of the most pressing talent challenges faced by global organizations. Nearly 9 out of 10 global HR and business leaders (86 percent) cited leadership as a top issue. Fully 50 percent of respondents in our survey rated their leadership shortfalls as “very important.” Yet only 6 percent of organizations believe their leadership pipeline is “very ready”—pointing to a staggering capability gap."

Too few leaders receive any development, there is a lack of corporate investment, and ultimately a weak leadership pipeline.

One area where global mobility and talent management seem to align nicely though is when the two combine to create programs to develop global leaders.

This article details the initiatives that Metlife leveraged when they built their global leadership development program through a rotational assignment program. Over five years and three rotations, Metlife expects leaders to move into feeder-level general management roles. The unique piece of this program is they complete one to two of these rotations for at least two years at a time in a country that they’ve not had experience in before.

They feel that their focus and effort on developing global leaders through this program is having a huge talent impact that translates into their overall corporate success.

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To date, this has come primarily in the form of the company’s global leadership development program,” which takes 10 to 15 MBA recruits from the world’s top business schools and provides them at least one international assignment, in addition to other business rotations.
“What is unique about the global leadership development program is it basically guarantees these individuals at least one international assignment outside of their home country in three rotations that they go through,” Dhanesar said.
“Over five years and three rotations,” he continued, “we expect them to move into feeder-level general management roles, but the unique piece of this program is they complete at least one to two of these rotations for at least two years at a time in a country that they’ve not had experience in before.”